25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the
life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; 26
and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
- John 11:25-26, The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan
Publishing House) 1984.
Dear Friends in Christ,
What is the predominant emotion for the Christian at Easter?
Certainly the announcement of the angel that the tomb is empty fills us with a feeling of joy and happiness. As we punctuate our Easter hymns and make our Easter acclamations with "alleluias," if our soul is not transported and our spirit is not lifted high – well, we better check our pulse. Joy, happiness, an almost giddy sense of upliftedness – these are the emotions of Easter for the believer.
But I would suggest that when it comes to the bottom line of the personal effect Christ’s resurrection has on our lives, the hymnist hit the nail right on the head when he wrote the refrain of the hymn we sang just a minute ago: "I am Content." Contentment is what Easter is all about…
And that same statement can be made by each one of us as we once again ponder the Easter message...
I AM CONTENT
Why?
1. Because Jesus’ resurrection proves He is who He says He is
2. Because Jesus’ resurrection means my salvation is secure
3. Because Jesus’ resurrection means we, too, will rise from the dead
Jesus’ resurrection first of all proves He is who He said He is. And He claimed to be nothing less than the almighty, eternal Son of God. He made this claim many times.
To a woman at a well in the country of Samaria who expressed hope in the Savior God who was to come, Jesus said, "You’re talking to Him."
When Jesus asked Peter as the spokesman for the disciples who they considered Him to be, Peter said: "You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God." Jesus accepted his statement. Later, when the disciples asked Jesus to "show us the Father" (i.e., God), Jesus answered, "Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father."
And when, in His trial before the religious leaders, the question was put to Him, "Are you the Christ?", His reply was "Yes, it is as you say."
You get the picture. Jesus never hid the fact of who He was. But Jesus was more than just big talk. He authenticated this claim with His miracles. He did miracles of healing. He did miracles over nature. He did miracles of resurrection. In fact, the words of our text were spoken shortly before Jesus raised His friend Lazarus from the dead. All these different miracles testified to His claims about #1) His person – that He is God the Son and #2) The truth of His message – that forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation was through Him alone…
But of all the things He ever said and all the things He ever did, the biggest claim He ever made was that He would die, and then three days later rise from the dead. "Destroy this temple" said Jesus, "And I will raise it again in three days."
To make a long story short, on Good Friday He died, and today He arose. The ladies who went to His grave on that first Easter morning with the expectation of performing last funeral rites were not met by a corpse in the initials stages of decay, but by an empty tomb and angels who said, "Why are you looking for the living among the dead? He is not here, He is risen, JUST AS HE SAID."<
Do you see the significance of this? "Just as He said" He died. "Just as He said" He rose. Everything happened "Just as He said." Jesus did something we cannot do; rising from the dead is something only God can do. And that’s who He claimed to be. Consequently the resurrection proves He is who He says He is: The Son of God, our Redeemer and Savior. Furthermore, it proves that He is reliable in every other promise and claim that He makes…
And that brings us enormous comfort. Because "just as He said" He would rise, He also says many other wonderful and marvelous things to us…
For example, Jesus gives us the promise of His abiding presence in our lives when He says, "Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you." Jesus gives us the promise that we are never alone when He says, "Surely I will be with you always, even to the very end of the age." Jesus gives us the promise that He hears and answers our prayers.... Jesus gives us the promise that nothing shall separate us from the love of Christ... Jesus tells us that no matter how we may perceive things, He has a plan for us and makes all things work for the good of those who love Him...
All these promises Jesus makes to us in His Word. Why can we believe Him? What proof do we have that He can carry them out? Go to the tomb. It’s empty – "just as He said." And just as He proved Himself reliable in this greatest of claims and promises, so He is reliable in every other promise He makes to us.
Therefore, with this knowledge, this assurance, this proof of reliability that He is who He says He is – I AM CONTENT.
What else does Jesus resurrection mean to us? It means my eternal salvation is complete and secure. Let us briefly return in time to Good Friday, for Easter Sunday means nothing unless it is paired with Good Friday…
On Good Friday we saw Jesus crucified. For approximately six hours He endured one of the most painful deaths devised by man. For three of those hours (when darkness covered the earth), He suffered the very pangs of hell and experienced something we never will – utter abandonment by God. Finally, after He voluntarily gave up His life with the cry, "It is finished," He was laid in the unused tomb of Joseph of Arimathea.
This is what happened. More importantly is why it happened. And why it happened to Christ is so that it wouldn’t happen to us…
You see, God demands perfect obedience of His creatures. "The soul that sins is the soul shall die… The wages of sin is death" says God in the Scriptures. We fall under that category. We are sinners deserving of eternal death. In an age that worships at the twin altars of self-esteem and positive self-image, an age that handles the concept of sin by redefining it until every transgression can be clothed in the garb of respectability, this is not a popular statement. Nonetheless, this is the truth of God: We are sinners deserving of eternal death.
But God is love. The same God who says the soul that sins will die also says that He takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked. So He came up with a plan to harmonize both His love for the sinner and His just hatred for sin. That plan was His Son.
Jesus, the Son of God, became a man to do as man’s substitute that which we could not do. He lived the perfect life in our place. And then He suffered the punishment for sin in our place. In His life and in His death, He came to be our surrogate.
The cover story for this week’s issue of U.S. News and World Report magazine is entitled, "Why Jesus Was Killed – Scholars find new clues about the Crucifixion." It’s about what you’d expect from a secular newsmagazine, and there are no "new clues" as promised. Jesus is portrayed purely in political terms as one who bucked the religious system to the point where he became so bothersome that they eliminated him.
But that’s not why Jesus was killed. And the responsibility for putting him on the cross extends far beyond the betraying Judas, or the intensely envious Jewish leaders, or the unprincipled Pontius Pilate. We put him there. The Roman guard may have lifted the hammer to pound the spikes through our Lord’s hands and feet, but it was the weight of our sins that brought the hammer down. The Apostle Paul summarizes it succinctly when he says, "He was delivered over to death for our sins…"
But that was then. Today is Easter. And the body that suffered for our sins is no longer in the tomb. What does it mean? It means His mission of redemption was satisfactorily accomplished. The empty tomb is God’s stamp of approval on Christ’s redemptive work. In the words of a contemporary Easter song, it means "He’s alive and I’m forgiven, heaven’s gates are open wide." It means the fulfillment of Jesus statement, "I am the resurrection and the life…" and it means the assurance that "Whoever believes in me will live, even though he dies, and whoever lives and believes in Me will never die."
In other words, the resurrection means the death of death. The English poet John Donne understood exactly what Jesus meant when he penned these well known words…
Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so.
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
The resurrection of Jesus means that death – both our own and our loved ones – is a comma, not a period. It is not a door that merely shuts out earthly existence, but a gate that leads to eternal life for all who trust in Him as Savior.
And because of the knowledge that my salvation is complete, that my place in heaven has been secured, that death is but the gate to eternal life – I AM CONTENT.
Jesus resurrection has a third and final meaning for us, which we’ll touch upon just briefly. It means we, too, will rise from the dead.
In our creeds we confess that we believe in "the resurrection of the body." How can we say that? What’s the basis? Once again, the answer is found in the empty tomb. The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15, "Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep." Firstfruits is really an Old Testament agricultural term which referred to offering God the first portion of a harvest. It was also an indication that more was to follow…
The point: Christ was the first to rise; and we, too, will rise from the dead to live both body and soul in heaven… There to live in a glorified resurrection body free from any and all imperfections eternally in a joy and happiness and a Christ-centered fellowship which is beyond the very beginning of imagination.
Because that is what the future holds for me, the present becomes more bearable. And with that to look forward to – I AM CONTENT.
Yes, today present in the heart of every believer with a pulse is joy and happiness and gratitude. But for those who understand the message of Easter, above all else is a warm, pervasive feeling of contentment.
Knowing my Jesus is the Son of God reliable in everything He says and does… Knowing that my salvation is complete and secure… Knowing that someday I will be with my Lord both body and soul forever in heaven – all the results of the empty tomb of Jesus – each of us can happily say: I AM CONTENT!
He is risen. He is risen indeed. Alleluia. Amen.